The Super Sanctity of the Y Chromosome

The Super Sanctity of the Y Chromosome

Women may not be ordained as deacons or priests in the Catholic Church. The rule has always been controversial and has alienated many men and women from the Church. In 2015, 88% of Catholics in the U.S. said that they would “feel comfortable” with the ordination of women (Fact Sheet, 2026). Yet, despite this and the reality that women in the early Church served as deacons and presbyters — with and without ordination — the Church insists that biology is a deal breaker even to those who are called to sacerdotal lives (Torjesen, 1995).

Prior to 200 CE (Common Era/AD), policies on ordination were ambiguous and inconsistent (Osborne, 1989, pp. 86–88). During the first centuries CE, there were many Christian communities scattered across the Mediterranean world, and their doctrines, protocols, and views of Jesus were significantly diverse. Ordained women some did not, and ordained women were allowed to do some things in one region while not in others. The Church acquired its monolithic orthodoxy gradually, and by 500 CE it came to resemble something modern Catholics might recognize.

Prohibitions against female clerics were created by male clerics in doctrinal councils of the 4^th and 5^th centuries. These clerics were informed not only by scriptures, but by the opinions of various scholars and Church officials. The apostles taught that women were to learn in silence, not to speak in church, and be subservient (1Cor. 14:34; 1 Tim 2:11-15) Bishop Irenaeus (c. 180) taught that Eve was the gateway through which evil entered the world, and by extension, all women were agents of devils and conduits of sin (Ewing, 2017). Tertullian, theologian, (c. 206 CE) asserted that women should not be permitted to speak in church or claim the office of priest as they were shameful creatures and gateways to the devil (Rankin, 1995, pp. 175–180).  In Heresies (c. 428 CE), St. Agustine chastised Christian sects that allowed women to be priests, and St. Epiphanius (Against Heresies, c. 374 CE) declared that the idea of ordaining women was arrogance and insanity on the part of women (Most, 2025).

Thomas Aquinas (c. 1275) asserted that women were physically, mentally, morally, and spiritually inferior to men. He believed that that male seeds formed babies once embedded in the womb (without a female egg) and that female babies were defects. Thus, Christ had to be male to be fully human (Ruether, 2014). In 1378, Canon Law 30 asserted that those who conferred the ordination of women would be excommunicated.

The Councils of Nicaea (325 CE), Laodicea (363 CE), Nimes 394 CE) and Orange (441 CE) all limited or prohibited the ordination of women (Christiansen, 2025). In 1976, the Pontifical Biblical Commission stated, “It does not seem that the New testament by itself alone will permit us to settle “ the “problem” of  women’s ordination (Osborne, 1989, p. 88). In the same year, the Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith reiterated the Church’s opposition to the ordination of women, claiming that it was merely acting in concert with Church tradition, the practices of the apostles, and, most importantly, the lack of evidence that Jesus ever called women to be among his apostles (Sacred Congregation, 1976).  Three years later, Pope John Paul emphasized the need to honor tradition and claimed that only male apostles were “intimately associated in the mission of the Incarnate Word himself” — an astonishing assertion given women’s witnessing to the resurrected Christ, women’s devotion to Jesus’ teaching, and women’s exhibition of faith in his divinity that at times excelled that of male apostles.

Critics argue that tradition and apostolic attitudes fall short of God’s inclusivity as they were tainted by ancient cultural biases that women were inferior to men. The Church, however, is careful not to cast too much blame on ancient culture. To do so would be to expose the ways that manmade norms and narratives narrow the possibilities for God’s grace and ongoing revelations. The Church acknowledges Jesus’ positive regard for women, but insists that Jesus never saw them true apostles (John Paul II, 1994).

The Church’s anxiety about gender is punctuated in the Council of Nicaea’s prohibition of castrated males in the priesthood and its rules that priests should be celibate and refrain from living with women unless they were mothers or siblings. The Church currently teaches that the individual’s gender is based in biology manifest at birth and regards gender correction or reassignment as a transgression against God (National Catholic Bioethics Center, 2017). Critics note that biological gender is not as binary as it may seem, as neurotransmitters and receptors, hormones, and psychological experiences of individuals are powerful variables in how people understand their gender identity and sexuality.

At present, the Church forbids transgender males from becoming priests. According to its doctrines, men are genuine males only when emerging from the womb with the requisite genitalia. So the rule stands: no penis, no priest. This has not discouraged transgender men from following their call to follow Christ and to seek ordination. Hey have been denied on the basis of their identity at birth and potential problems with “complex psychosexual history” (Barone, 2024).  At present, transgender males can take vows only as brothers.

The Church asserts that bishops, cardinals, and popes are the authentic teachers of faith and morals, and that only males can be bishops, cardinals, and popes. It is logical for institutions to retain experts trained in its mission and values in order to ensure that the true mission of the institution remains intact from generation to generation. Institutional missions and consistency, however, are not necessarily Godly. The Church’s belief that God created all humans in God’s image is problematic because it insists that the absence of the Y chromosome diminishes being made in the image of God and disqualifies some from full participation in the sacerdotal ministry.

The notion that only men can be authentic teachers of faith and morals — whether applied institutionally or universally — is problematic because it limits the possibilities of a God who can do all things, and who has the right to call women to a life of ordained ministry.  The Church’s assertion that women are prohibited by tradition from teaching matters of faith and morals and from administering all the sacraments elevates the primacy of tradition over God’s ongoing revelations about what it means to love as God loves and about the spiritual essence of our own being. If Jesus had subordinated his message and ministry to tradition, it is unlikely that he would not have challenged the letter of the law, offered Gentiles redemption, and likely that he would have obeyed the pharisees.

Arguably, God’s invitation to articulate the kingdom of God on earth calls upon human beings to  transcend their egos and culturally generated underpinnings of their sense of self. Giving oneself over to God in this way means giving up identity politics, tribalism, and all the privileges that attend one’s status as a male, a member of the wealthy class, and one’s position vis-à -vis the least of our brothers and sisters.

St. Paul asserted that in Christ there is no male nor female, no Jew nor Gentile, no slave nor master (Gal. 3:28). With this blazing insight, he availed the faithful to new possibilities of humanity that were not anchored to ethnicity, nationality, religious backgrounds, gender, class, and culture — a humanity that saw God when looking within and without. The insight liberates people from caste systems and coaxes the faithful to look beyond the artifice of culture and see that institutions that facilitate the individual’s use of all God’s gifts offers more ways to leaven God’s love into our lives than does the suppression of any of God’s gifts.

References

Barone, Camillio. Transgender Catholics Face Barriers to Religious Life, Find Peace in Communities. National Catholic Reporter, October 24, 2024. Transgender Catholics face barriers to religious life, find peace in communities | National Catholic Reporter.

Christiansen, Maria. Nicaea and Women’s Ordained Ministry. The Ecumenical Review, 77(1-2): 109–19. (2025).

Ewing, Jeffrey A. Women as the Devil’s Gateway: A Feminist Critique of Christian Demonology. In B. W. McCraw & R. Arp (Eds.) Philosophical Approaches to Demonology. Routledge, 2017. Pp. 75–91.

Fact Sheet on Catholic Women’s Ordination. Women’s Ordination Conference, 2026. Fact sheet on Catholic Women’s Ordination – Women’s Ordination Conference.

John Paul II. On Reserving Priestly Ordination to Men Alone, 1994 Vatican, 2026. Ordinatio Sacerdotalis (May 22, 1994).

Most, William. Texts on the Ordination of Women. EWTN, 2025. Texts on Ordination of Women | EWTN.

National Center for Catholic Bioethics Center. Brief Statement on Transgenderism, February 22, 2017. Brief Statement on Transgenderism — The National Catholic Bioethics Center.

Osborne, Kenen B. Priesthood: A History of Ordained Ministry in the Catholic Church. NY: Paulist Press, 1989.

Rankin D. Women in Ministry. In: Tertullian and the Church. Cambridge University Press, 1995.

Ruether, Rosemary Radford. Sexism and Misogyny in the Christian Tradition: Liberating Alternatives. Buddhist-Christian Studies, 34: 83-94. (2014).

Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. Declaration on the Question of Admission of Women to the Ministerial Priesthood, 1976. Vatican. Declaration on the Question of Admission of Women to the Ministerial Priesthood, 15 October 1976.

Torjesen, Karen. When Women Were Priests. San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1995.

Wijngaards, John. Pope Gelacius I. Wijngaards’ Institute for Catholic Research.  Pope Gelasius I – Women Deacons.